Ixom Best Tasting Tap Water in Victoria

The search for the best tasting tap water in Victoria?

The Ixom Best Tasting Tap Water in Victoria competition is a fun and exciting way to raise awareness of the quality of drinking water and to recognise the efforts of local water service providers in delivering valuable water services to their communities.

The award for the Best Tasting Tap Water will be judged and presented as part of the WIOA Victorian Water Operations Conference & Exhibition with the winner announced as having the Best Tasting Water in the State.

About the Ixom Best Tasting Tap Water in Victoria

All water businesses in Victoria are invited to participate in the Ixom Best Tasting Tap Water in Victoria.

Each water business is asked to nominate one preferred sample for inclusion in the competition.

Where businesses operate multiple water supply systems, the decision regarding which water sample to enter is left up to each water business.

All entries must have incurred no serious state or federal drinking water violations during the past year*.

Requirements

Samples must be submitted by 4.00pm on Tuesday 4 September 2018 in a clearly marked container with the name of the water business it represents and the location/town from where the sample is derived.

We require 3 litres of the sample water which must be provided in 3 x 1 litre sealed glass containers.

Samples need to be delivered to the conference venue at room temperature. Cooled samples will not be admitted.

Samples will be served at room temperature, to help the judges better taste, appreciate and rank each sample.

Competition Judging

Heats

Heats will be conducted at the WIOA Welcome Reception held on the afternoon (from 4.45-6.00pm) of Tuesday 4 September 2018 at the Bendigo conference venue.

The competition will be divided into heats, with entries placed in each heat randomly drawn by WIOA staff.

Each heat will have a heat co-ordinator.

Heat judging will be undertaken by guests at the welcome reception who shall taste all samples and select their most favoured water sample by giving it one vote.

The sample with the most votes will be judged the heat winner and the winner will proceed to the Grand Final to be held on the main stage during the conference lunch break on Wednesday afternoon.

In the case of a tie i the heats, the winner will be chosen by the heat co-ordinator from those that are tied.

The four Grand Finalists will be announced on the Tuesday evening and we would appreciate a representative from each business being available for the main judging on Wednesday and at the winners presentation at the Awards Dinner on Thursday evening.

Grand Final

As with the heats, the origin of each sample will not be revealed. The samples will be judged by a panel nominated by WIOA comprising technical water experts and water industry connoisseurs.

Samples will be judged on a point scale from good to best.

Scores will be aggregated and the winner will be the sample with the highest combined score. The winning water business and water supply location will be announced at the lunch on Wednesday and the presntation made at the WIOA Conference Awards Dinner on Thursday night.

Only the identity of the four grand finalists and the supplier of the winning sample will be announced – Grand Final or Heat samples will not be ranked, nor will any of the scores be released.

The decision of the judges is final.

*A “serious” water quality incident includes protracted periods of poor water quality or boiled water alerts, an event leading to immediate potential public health risks or other break-down of risk-management protocols.